Sir Michael Endering sat erect behind his huge mahogany desk. Sat pressed into his high-backed leather chair like the statue of a man enthroned. The lights in the study were off, all of them. The green velvet curtains were drawn. The walls of bookshelves were only faintly visible.

Belham Grange was silent all around him, silent everywhere.

The great man sat stalwart. The prow-like chin was raised, the mighty head upheld. He seemed unaware that his features had collapsed over the last several hours, had thinned amazingly and grown old. His lips were parted and flecked with white drops of spittle. His cheeks were suddenly hollowed and pale, the ruddiness gone from them. His silver hair was in frantic disarray.

His eyes, glinting in the dark, were shifting, quick, afraid.

This was how they were going to get at him, he thought. In the cruelest way. Through his daughter.

Long minutes passed. Sir Michael stirred. He reached into his waistcoat pocket and brought out a ring of keys. He gazed down at them lying in his big hand as if he was not sure what they were. He murmured wordlessly. Swiveled slightly. And bent down to unlock the desk’s bottom drawer.

He brought out an elegant box topped with studded green leather. He set it on the blotter before him. Unlocked it, opened it.

On a tray in the box lay a line of Havana cigars and a sterling silver lighter. The tray lifted out to reveal a swatch of velvet underneath.

Underneath the swatch of velvet was an ugly and brutal-looking revolver.

It was a snub-nosed .38, American, Smith & Wesson. So compact he could nearly swallow it in his enormous palm. A cardboard box of bullets lay beside it.

Sir Michael lifted the pistol out, cracked the cylinder. Spun the chambers once to assure himself the gun was oiled. His long fingers were unsteady on the bullet box, but he got it open, removed a bullet, two. He sniffed once, as if disdainfully, but then his whole body shuddered.

His daughter was coming to the house tomorrow. His daughter—and Richard Storm.